David Sutton - The Satyr's Head - Tales of Terror

‘In what way can’t you understand me?’ Lamson asked.

There was a dispirited tiredness to his voice which Sutcliffe could tell didn’t spring from boredom or disinterest.

Folding his arms, Sutcliffe leant over the table towards him.

‘It’s two weeks now since you last went out with Joan. And that was the night we all went to the Tavern. Since then nothing. No word or anything. From you… But Joan has called round to your flat four times this week, though you weren’t apparently in. Unless you’ve found someone else you’d better know that she won’t keep on waiting for you to see her. She has her pride, and she can tell when she’s being snubbed. Don’t get me wrong. I wouldn’t like you to think I’m interfering, but it was Joan who asked me to mention this to you if I should bump into you. So, if you have some reason for avoiding her, I’d be glad if you’d let me know.’ He shrugged, slightly embarrassed by what he’d had to say. ‘If you’d prefer to tell me to mind my own bloody business I’d understand, of course. But, even if only for Joan’s sake, I’d rather you’d say something.’

Suppressing a cough, Lamson wiped his mouth with a handkerchief, held ready in his hand. He wished he could tell Sutcliffe the reason why he was avoiding Joan, for a deliberate avoidance it was.

‘I haven’t been feeling too good recently,’ he replied evasively.

‘Is it anything serious?’

Lamson shook his head. ‘No, it’s nothing serious. I’ll be better in a while. A bad dose of flu, that’s all. But it’s been lingering on.’

Sutcliffe frowned. He did not like the way in which his friend was acting these days, so unlike the open and friendly manner in which he had always behaved before, at least with him. Even allowing for flu, this neither explained the change in his character nor the peculiar swellings about his mouth. If it was flu, it was a flu of a far more serious nature than any he’d ever had himself. And how, for Christ’s sake, could that explain the way in which his skin seemed to have become coarse and dry, especially about the knuckles on his hands?

‘Have you been eating the right kinds of foods?’ Sutcliffe asked. ‘I know what it can be like living in a flat. Tried it once for a while. Never again! Give me a boarding house anytime. Too much like hard work for me to cook my own meals, I can tell you. I dare say you find it much like that yourself.’

‘A little,’ Lamson admitted, staring at his beer without interest or appetite as three men wearing election rosettes pressed by towards the bar. One of them said:

‘I wouldn’t be at all surprised if it wasn’t something all these Asians have been bringing into the country. There’s been an increase in TB already, and that was almost unheard of a few years ago.’

‘It’s certainly like nothing I’ve ever heard of, that’s for sure,’ one of the other two said.

As the men waited for their drinks, one of them turned round, smiling in recognition when he saw Lamson.

‘Hello there. I didn’t notice you were here when we came in.’

‘Still working hard, I see,’ Lamson said, nodding at the red, white and blue National Front rosette on the man’s jacket.

‘No rest for the wicked. Someone’s got to do the Devil’s work,’ the man joked as the other two smiled in appreciation of his joke. ‘It’s the local elections in another fortnight,’ he added.

Collecting their drinks, the men sat down at the table beside Lamson and Sutcliffe.

‘I overheard you talking about TB. Has there been a sudden outbreak or something?’ Lamson asked.

‘Not TB,’ the man said. ‘We’ve just been talking to an old woman who told us that a tramp was found dead in an alleyway near her house earlier this week. From what we were able to gather from her, even the ambulance men themselves, who you’d think would be pretty well-hardened to that kind of thing, were shaken by what they saw.’

‘What was it’’ Sutcliffe asked. ‘A mugging?’

‘No,’ Reynolds — the man who had spoken — said with a dull satisfaction. ‘Apparently he died from some kind of disease. They’re obviously trying to keep news about it down, though we’re going to try to find out what we can about it. So far there’s been no mention in the press, though the local rag— Billy’s Weekly Liar —isn’t acting out of character there, especially with the elections coming up. So, just what it is we don’t know, though it must be serious. Sickening, is how the old woman described him, though how she got a look at him is anybody’s guess. But you know what these old woman are like. Somehow or other she managed to get a bloody good look — too good a look, I think, for her own peace of mind in the end! According to what she told us there were swellings and sores and discolourations all over his body. And blood dripping out of his mouth, as if his insides had been eaten away.’

Lamson shuddered.

‘What’s the matter?’ Sutcliffe asked as he lit a cigarette.

Lamson smiled weakly.

‘Just someone stepping over my grave, that’s all,’ he said. He took a long drink of his beer as the three men drained theirs. Putting his glass down, empty, Reynolds stood up. ‘We’d better be off back to our canvassing or someone’ll be doing a clog dance on our graves. And we’ll be in them!’

As the men left, Lamson said that he could do with a whisky.

‘Just because of what you heard about some poor old sod of a tramp?’ Sutcliffe asked.

‘It’s not him,’ Lamson replied. ‘God help his miserable soul, but he was probably better off dead anyway.’ Though what he said was meant to sound offhand, his voice lacked the lightness of tone to carry it off successfully. Realizing this, he pushed his glass away. ‘I’m sorry — I must seem like poor company tonight. I think it would perhaps be better if I set off home. Perhaps we’ll meet up again tomorrow night? Yes?’

‘If you say so,’ Sutcliffe replied amicably. ‘You do look a bit under the weather tonight.’ A Hell of a lot under the weather, he added silently to himself. ‘Anyhow, now that you mention it, it’s about time I was on my way as well. I’ll walk along with you to my bus stop. It’s on your way.’

As they stepped out of the pub, Sutcliffe asked if he had been sleeping well recently.

‘What makes you ask?’

‘Your eyes,’ Sutcliffe said as the wind pushed against them, a torn newspaper scuttering along the gutter. ‘Red-rimmed and bleary. You ought to get a few early nights. Or see if your doctor can prescribe some sleeping pills for you. It’s probably what you need.’

Lamson stared down the road as they walked along it. How cold and lonely it looked, even with the cars hissing by through puddles of rain, and the people walking hurriedly along the pavement. There was a smell of fish and chips and the pungent aroma of curry as they passed a takeaway, but even this failed to make him feel at home on the street. He felt foreign and lost, alienated to the things and places which had previously seemed so familiar to him. Even with Sutcliffe he felt almost alone, sealed within himself.

As they parted a few minutes later at Sutcliffe’s stop outside the Unit Four on Market Street, his friend said:

‘I’ll be expecting you tomorrow. You’ve been keeping far too much to yourself recently. If you don’t watch out you’ll end up a hermit, and that’s no kind of fate for a friend of mine. So mind you’re ready when I call round. Okay?’

Lamson said that he would be. There was no point in trying to evade him. Sutcliffe was too persistent for that. Nor did he really want to evade him, not deep down. He pulled his coat collar up high about his neck and started off purposefully for his flat.